


Endless as the Ocean

by ilikecheesemaybe



Category: Charlie Bone Universe - Jenny Nimmo, Children of the Red King - Jenny Nimmo
Genre: M/M, Mermaid!Dagbert, Not Canon Compliant, mermaid au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-09
Updated: 2019-09-04
Packaged: 2019-09-14 20:24:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16919796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilikecheesemaybe/pseuds/ilikecheesemaybe
Summary: "As he pulled himself back into the water, he caught the boy waking and looking at him with haze filled confusion in his lovely hazel blue eyes."WaterPainting Little Mermaid AU.





	1. Actions Speak Louder Than Words

A young merman with a luminescent teal tail, kelp colored hair, and bright aquamarine eyes settled himself onto a group of rocks. With his heads in the clouds and his tail in the water, he stared at the land of the walking.

This was a dangerous game he was playing, but dear Mariana, how fond he was of staring at the shore his estranged father was from. Besides, other merchildren did the same thing all the time.

Being entranced by this odd waterless world wasn’t an uncommon occurrence among the younger generation, and despite what his mother says, Dagbert was perfectly capable of not getting into trouble thank you very much.

A few things he noticed in his limited observations were that this world wasn’t as big as the deep and wide ocean he called home was. It didn’t have many bright corals or anemone to swim around and hide in. No sea creatures to play with. From what he could see, you couldn’t let the waves rock you to new and exciting adventure-filled destinations either because there were no waves, water did not cover and fill every part of this world, as odd as this fact was for Dagbert to even dare to comprehend. Despite this; however, it was interesting in its own ways.

The soft-looking creatures, the moving light that was destroyed by water, but destroyed other things, the buildings with their set spots on the solid sand, that didn’t move around and didn’t have nearly as many open holes in them. The people and their odd split tail also intrigued him. He’s seen them swimming, but he had to wonder if it was hard for them to do so. 

There were so many questions he had to ask and things he wanted to learn.

He could never enter this place of course. His lack of a split tail was in of itself an issue. The fact that his father would hunt him down immediately and try and make up for lost time was anouther, at least in the ocean Dagbert could hide from the curse laid over his father’s family. His gold sea animal charms also helped an amount with hiding. Enchanted to protect him, he carried them on him at all times, strung up around his waist like a large necklace.

Breaking from his trance, he squinted at something rather odd near the cliffside. Two figures, silhouettes, to be more specific. One of them held a defensive stance, reminding him of a sea urchin on the defensive to avoid being eaten, not unlike the one strung around his waist. He couldn’t make out any other details besides the pose, but the pose in of itself was rather cute. The other figure seemed so aggressive, almost like an aggressive electric knifefish poised for a kill. 

_ They’re fighting  _ Dagbert realized as he swam closer to the cliff’s edge. Both figures were covered by the jagged edge, but now he could hear their argument, not quite, but he could recognize a few words. Aquatic was really just a mix of different land languages after all, but they were very loud and their tone suggested a heavy amount of anger. 

Suddenly, a grunt and a loud yell rang across the area consecutively. Dagbert heard the yell grow louder and louder as if it were coming closer to him.  _ Splash!  _ The impact of someone falling into the cold blue ocean was loud and sounded like ships crashing against rocks. 

Dagbert quickly sprung to action, diving under the ever familiar freezing waves, his tail cutting across the water’s plane. Then he saw him. Dark hair, pale visage, and a blue cape. Just a boy. He looked around Dagbert’s age, but so different all the same. He was unconscious, either from the shock causing him to inhale water or from the impact knocking him out. His hair floated around him like a crown. 

Despite being taken aback and briefly enchanted by the boy, Dagbert knew he had to get him out the water. He’s seen a fair amount of ships in storms, he knew what the ocean did to people without proper fins and gills.

He wrapped his arms securely around the caped boy and started slicing his way to to the surface as to prevent more water from getting into the other boy’s delicate, not waterproof lungs. When the pair broke the surface, he swam them to the shore. 

Reaching the dryer parts of the shoreline, forced his gills into a painful pulsing pattern. His gills couldn’t make heads or tails of the lack of water on land and his nose was most definitely more for aesthetic than for a function, his neck gills opened and closed around water that just wasn’t there. Sensing that he didn’t have much time left on land, he quickly placed the boy onto the sand. He screeched loudly, imitating a dolphin call in hopes someone would come to the caped boy’s rescue.  
  


As he pulled himself back into the water, he caught the boy waking and looking at him with haze filled confusion in his lovely hazel blue eyes.

As he finally got far enough to slip away, he saw the shadow of a group of people around the corner, he hoped they would help the boy on the sand.

As he hid under the waves, he and his heart simultaneously hoped the boy didn’t think much of him and would never wonder about him and that the boy would return to the ocean for the merman, safely next time.


	2. At Least Words Can Be Heard

Charlie saw a tail when he first woke up. It glistened beneath the blanket of sunlight shining down on the tailed figure. It glowed in a way that forced the rest of the world to dim down. The sky couldn’t compare to the blue in those shimmering scales. 

Charlie saw the boy after the initial shock faded. He caught the sight of a head of kelp-like hair and eyes as blue as the ocean and as bright as the sun. 

At least, he thinks he saw these things, mermaids weren’t real, right? A heartbeat later he felt himself being carried to his feet by three sets of hands, away from the shore. There had to be someone there. How else did he get out from under the waves? Someone had to be there. He didn’t make the boy up, right?

His friends hoisted him from the loose sand and onto solid concrete of Piminy Street, a dangerous street, but yet here he was confronting Manfred in the street. Near a cliff side as well, what was he even thinking.

“Charlie? Are you here with us? Are you ok?” Asked Olivia, while waving her hand over his face, concerned with how his eyes seemed to be pulled far away from them. 

Almost as if his mind was stuck traveling in a painting instead of being here in the present, which was a completely valid possibility considering what the Bloor’s have managed to manipulate the endowed to do to themselves with their endowments this far.

“Huh?” Charlie snapped out of his ocean-filled daze and turned to his illusionist friend, who was rocking bright pink hair this week, “What was that, Liv?” 

“What Olivia was trying to Ask was, Charlie, are you alright? You seem a bit shaken,” asked his softer-spoken psychometric friend, Gabriel, “It would make sense if you were, you almost drowned after all- just, Charlie, are you ok?”

“Yeah, I am.. I think so anyway. Did-“ Charlie started to say before he cut himself off and continued in a conspiratorial whisper, ”When I was at the shore, did you guys see anyone else? A boy maybe?”

Fidelio scrunched his eyebrows in concern, took a slow step towards Charlie and asked in a soft, calm tone, “Was there someone else on the beach with you?” 

Olivia followed Fidelio’s suit and stepped a bit closer to Charlie, Gabriel moved closer to Fidelio, completing the small circle around Charlie.

“I-I think I did.” Charlie stuttered out, his eyebrows scrunched in his confusion, his shoulders tense with excess energy, “I was really out of it, but I think I saw someone on the shore.”

Fidelio looked over to Olivia and Gabriel to see if he should inform Charlie of what led them to him. Olivia gave a thumbs up; however, her face was set in tentative grin, trying to reassure him but not too well. Gabriel gave a shaky yet resolute nod.

“Charlie, I think someone was there. We found you because we heard this loud noise by the shore. Maybe it was the boy you saw?” Fidelio said slowly as not to overwhelm Charlie too much.

Charlie let out a breath he didn’t notice he was holding, so he hadn’t been hallucinating the boy. Maybe he just hallucinated the tail. The boy probably just got nervous and hid in the water. No tail. Not a mermaid. Just a scared boy who didn’t want to deal with an unconscious boy for any longer than he had to.  
“Well, if that’s all. I mean. He has to be good right? He saved me!” 

“Yeah, he’s gotta be!” Olivia agreed,” He helped Charlie live another day!” Olivia shouts, fist pumping the air with a jump, breaking the circle of students, “I say this brilliant feat of survival and camaraderie calls for a celebration.” She flaunts dramatically, “To the Bookstore to retrieve our dearest Emma, then to Gabriel’s for gerbils, and then off to Pet’s Cafe!”

“Leave it to Olivia to brighten the mood! Onwards then!” Fidelio exclaimed, as he grabbed Gabriel’s hand and started to walk in the direction of Emma’s home.

“Come in, Charlie. The day is still young, but we won’t be if you just stand there!” Olivia dashes up ahead in front of the boys.

Charlie tucked away his thoughts of the ocean and hurried to catch up with the other three. The ocean could wait for him another day. ‘And another day would come’ Charlie assured himself. Surely, one of those days the other boy would be there.


	3. Sometimes Being Silent is The Best Option

Dagbert wanted to promise himself that he was smarter than this. He wanted to promise to himself that he was smart enough to know that he shouldn’t return to the beautiful surface above. The boy from the surface knew someone saved him by the shore, he would probably be more cautious in searching for people in the water. Dagbert wanted to promise to himself, with almost all his heart, that he had enough sense to not return to the surface, but he couldn’t.

He never could. 

He never could resist the call of the sky before and that wouldn’t change because of some boy, no matter how warm his eyes we- No matter how much of a threat he was! He quickly shook off the deviation in his thoughts.

Every moment that he had to return to the depths of the cold abyss he called home. Every moment he spent away from the sun that half of him longed to bask in. Every moment he closed his eyes and all he could see was the boy. The boy with lovely warm brown eyes staring at him with such disbelief, such amazement. No one had ever looked at him that way before.

And maybe he was being selfish, putting himself- putting arguably all of merkind in danger, to see the sky, to catch even a glimpse of people who even so much as looked his age. But he was so empty here. Alone in the sea. It all felt so hollow. The ocean, the fish, his entire existence felt so meaningless. So when the heavens called for him, who was he to refuse?

 

So the very next day, he swam up and up and up. Until he broke the surface. Until he could feel the wind- the sun on his fins. He didn’t need to breathe air, never had to, growing up underwater. But he still considered it a pleasant experience, to allow the sea breeze air to pass through his rarely used nose and flood his lungs full of air.

He was not near the area where he was yesterday, but he was still close enough to just barely admire the distant shore. As he predicted, there on the beach was the boy from yesterday, yelling into the air with fierce and determined posture set into his frame. Even with the distance, Dagbert could see how determined he was. How very full of life this boy was. It was infectious.

 

Life and energy spilled from this boy in waves, the boy’s energy flooded his senses and seeped into every crevice of Dagbert’s mind. And that spurred him to get closer like Icarus was so thoroughly attracted to the sun. With curiosity running through his veins, Dagbert slipped into the water silently, he swims closer, so very precariously closer, trying to catch the words in the wind. 

 

“I won’t hurt you! I promise! Please, whoever you were please show yourself! I just want to thank you!” 

 

The boy didn’t speak with any less intensity than what one would expect from someone who stood so proud. His voice was nice. It felt very familiar, though Dagbert could swear that he had never met the boy in his life. His voice was so full of life. So bouncy and so warm. Everything about this boy was warm. 

For the first time in 13 years, Dagbert wanted to walk. He wanted to run up to the boy and say hello, to tell him his name, to ask for his, to see if he was as warm as he felt. He just wanted to know more. This boy with such warm eyes. This very same boy who wanted to say thank you to some stranger who, for all he knew, could be dangerous. 

 

So fueled by the boy’s cries, he swam. He swam fast and hard. He swam until his gills felt as if they were going to peel off his body, and then he swam more. 

He zipped past familiar structures and corals. He had taken this route hundreds of times before, but never quite so desperately. The water raced past him. And then he came to an inconspicuous cave.

 

The cave was cold, even by the ocean’s standards. It was made by  _ him _ after all so that was to be expected. His father. The man his mother hated letting him see, but the man he visited twice monthly nonetheless. It would be cruel to keep a man from his son after all.

 

Twice a month, every month since his birth, Dagbert would meet up with his father to talk. Usually about mundane things, such as “When will you come to your senses and join me on land?” or “When will you get your head out of the sea and learn to face your fate?” Always the same questions. And he would be gifted a new trinket or toy to scratch up or repurpose. Always with the trinkets, he wasn’t a child to be bribed! 

...Which is what he would say if his mother had raised a liar. He adores trinkets and he could absolutely be bribed with them, but his father knew not of the trinkets that could make his son tick. So every time he visited, his father would ask him the same questions, then play the trinket guessing game. Dagbert would win every time.

 

Not this time. 

 

“I am not unpleased with this revelation, but I must inquire, what made you change your mind?” Lord Grimwald asked in his cold, slimy voice.

 

“I felt curious.” Dagbert shrugged from his place in the water, casually, so Lord Grimwald wouldn’t know any better. No way was he going to tell this man about the boy on the beach. The boy was his secret and his alone. Grimwald has enough leverage to keep him on land, thank you very much.

 

Grimwald pulls a vial from his pocket and holds it out to the merman. Despite the dread he feels, Dagbert can only wonder how long Grimwald has been carrying that around.

Dagbert takes the vial and downs it in one gulp.


End file.
